1. Field of the Invention
An aspect of the present invention relates to a method of booting a computer system using a master boot record, and, more particularly, to a storage medium that is capable of performing a booting process by storing master boot record data being changed and by recovering a master boot record at a desired time.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, a hard disk drive (HDD) of a computer system is characterized by storage addresses that range from a zero address to a maximum address, and includes one or more cylinders and a master boot record (MBR). In this case, the master boot record is allocated to one sector that forms the hard disk drive and notifies the computer system how to boot from the hard disk and in which sectors all the files are allocated to. In addition, the master boot record includes a file allocation table (FAT) having information on the positions of all files and data and the position of the hard disk drive.
Meanwhile, the computer system performs booting using the master boot record. FIG. 1 shows the configuration of a computer system for performing booting according to the related art. As shown in FIG. 1, the computer system, according to the related art, includes a flash memory 140 having BIOS data related to the basic operation of the computer system stored therein, a central processing unit 110 that reads out the BIOS data from the flash memory 140 and boots the computer system, a controller 120 that is operated by the central processing unit 110 and reads/writes data from/to the flash memory 140, a hard disk drive 190 that stores data and has a boot record to store booting records recorded therein, and a hard disk controller 180 that outputs controls signals to drive the hard disk drive 190 according to instructions from the central processing unit 110.
A booting process of the computer system having the above-mentioned configuration according to the related art will be described below.
When power is supplied to the computer system, the central processing unit 110 outputs an address signal to enable the controller 120. The controller 120 enabled by the central address device 110 activates a ROM selection signal that reads the address signal and data from the flash memory 140. Then, a ROM BIOS in the flash memory 140 performs a POST (power on self test) routine to check hardware of the computer system and the state of the hard disk drive 190. The ROM BIOS reads the master boot record of the hard disk drive 190 through the hard disk controller 10. However, when the ROM BIOS does not read the master boot record of the hard disk drive 190, a message “Drive Failure” or an equivalent thereto is output to a user. The message informs the user of a booting error. When the ROM BIOS of the flash memory 140 reads the master boot record of the hard disk drive 190 without errors, the controller 120 transmits the read BIOS data to the central processing unit 110 through the system bus 150. Then, the computer system is automatically booted in a predetermined booting order.
However, in the booting process of the computer system according to the related art, the master boot record of the hard disk drive 190 may be deleted or damaged due to, for example, viruses, which prevent booting processes from progressing. In this case, the user should use an additional recovery tool to boot the computer system, or the user needs to request an expert in this field to recovery the computer system, resulting in a high recovery cost.